Operator-protecting safety razors



Jan. 9, 1968 G. 5. WILSON OPERATOR-PROTECTING SAFETY RAZORS Filed July 15, 1965 FIG 3 N m TW WAY N N w m E W as M 0 Z Q Q ATTORNEYS United States Patent 3,362,067 OPERATOR-PROTECTING SAFETY RAZORS George S. Wilson, High Point, NC. (503 Lytle Towers, 4th and Broadway, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202) Filed July 15, 1965, Ser. No. 472,208 2 Claims. (Cl. 30-605) ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A safety razor which has an elongated supporting plate for engaging an inner face of a blade and supporting the latter in the razor. This supporting plate has a pair of opposed ends along which a pair of flap supports respectively extend, and a pair of closure flaps are pivotally carried by these flap supports for movement between open and closed positions. When these closure flaps are in their open positions a blade can be removed and replaced, while when the flaps are in their closed positions they engage an outer face of the blade and substantially cover the latter. These closure flaps each have a length which is greater than that of the blade and each closure flap terminates in a pair of opposed stepped end portions which directly engage and extend freely beyond the end edges of the blade so as to prevent these end edges from projecting beyond the confines of the razor. The closure flaps are pivotally connected to the flap supports by depending portions of the closure flaps which respectively engage and overlap exterior faces of the flap supports. These flap supports themselves are situated closer to each other than the total length of the blade so that when the flaps are in their open position the opposed end edges of the blade are freely accessible to facilitate grasping thereof.

The present inventionrelates to shaving implements.

More particularly, the present invention relates to safety razors.

As is well known safety razors are adapted to receive blades which are almost entirely enclosed with the safety razor so as to expose cutting edges of the blade which can safely be used for shaving purposes.

However, in practice the cutting blades used in the safety razors conventionally have free ends which project beyond the confines of the razor. While the free ends of the cutting blades are not sharpened, nevertheless because it is conventional to make the cutting blades of an extremely thin metal, these end edges of the conventional cutting blades, because they project beyond the confines of the safety razor, are quite dangerous and are capable of inflicting injury on the operator if the razor is carelessly handled.

It is therefore a primary object of the present invention to provide a safety razor which will be much safer to use than a conventional safety razor.

In particular, it is an object of the present invention to provide a safety razor which will prevent a conventional blade from projecting beyond the confines of the razor at the ends of the blade.

Furthermore, it is an object of the invention to increase the safety of conventional safety razors with a minimum amount of modification of the safety razors from the structure which they conventionally include.

In particular, it is an object of the invention to provide a safety razor which will be manipulated by the operator in the usual way, so that no special manipulations are required by the structure of the invention.

Primarily, according to the present invention the safety razor is constructed in such a way that the free ends of a blade cannot project beyond the confines of the razor and thus the danger of injuries which might be inflicted by these free ends of the razor is avoided.

The invention is illustrated by way of example in the accompanying drawings which form part of the application and in which:

FIG. 1 is a top plan view of a safety razor according to the invention shown in its open position, FIG. 1 illustrating in dot-dash lines the position of a blade in the razor;

FIG. 2 is a longitudinal sectional elevation of the safety razor shown in FIG. 2 in a closed position;

FIG. 3 is a transverse section of a safety razor which has a structure somewhat difierent from that of FIGS. 1 and 2; and

FIG. 4 is a top plan view of the safety razor of FIG. 3 fragmentarily illustrating one end of the razor in an open position with a blade indicated in dot-dash lines.

Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the razor 10 illustrated therein includes a handle 12 provided at its bottom end, in a conventional manner, with a rotary member accessible to the operator. When the operator turns this rotary member a central post 14 will be raised and lowered, and a transverse vertical wall 16 will move up and down with the post 14. This wall 16 is movable relative to an elongated stationary supporting structure 18 fixed to the top end of the handle 12. The wall 16 has a pair of transverse end portions 20 which move up and down with respect to the stationary blade-supporting structure 18 and which respectively extend along the ends thereof. These portions 20 form closure flap supports, as is apparent from the description below. This stationary structure 18 is in the form of a substantially horizontal plate which has suitable slots and curvature for properly supporting a blade and for causing the closure structure of the razor to move between its open and closed positions.

This closure structure in the illustrated example includes a pair of closure flaps 22 pivotally connected to the end portions or closure flap supports 20 at 24 (FIG. 1) so that during vertical displacement of the wall 16 the closure flaps 22 by engaging portions of the supporting structure 18 will in a well known manner be cammed between the open and closed positions.

Conventionally the closure flaps 22 would be pivotally connected to the flap supports 20 at the inner surfaces 26 thereof. However, in accordance with the present invention these closure flaps 22 are made longer than conventional closure flaps and are pivotally connected to the end portions 20 at their outer surfaces.

As may be seen from the dot-dash lines in FIG. 1, a blade 28 which is represented by these dot-dash lines normally has its ends 30 projecting beyond the confines of the razor so that these exposed end edges can inflict injury on the operator if the razor is used carelessly. As may be seen in FIG. 1, these end edges 30 normally project beyond the confines of the razor. However, by making the closure flaps 22 of the closure means of the razor at least as long as the blade 28 and also by pivotally connecting the closure flaps 22 to the end portions 20 of the displaceable structure 14, 16 at the exterior surface of these end portions, the free end edges 30 of the blade 28 will be reliably covered by the flaps 22 so that these edges 30 will not project beyond the confines of the razor. In this way the razor is rendered far safer to use. Closure flaps 22 include raised or stepped end portions 23 adapted for clamping engagement with the blade 28 as best shown in FIG. 2. These end portions 23 directly engage the outer face of blade 28 at its end edges and extend freely beyond these end edges, as is clearly apparent from FIG. 2. Also, as is clearly apparent from FIG. 1, the opposed closure flap supports 20 are situated from each other by a distance less than the length of the blade, so that when the closure flaps are in their open positions shown in FIG. 1, the ends 30 of the blade extend freely beyond the flap supports 20 so as to be freely 3 accessible to the operator whose grasping of the blade is thus facilitated.

A somewhat different construction is shown in FIGS. 3 and 4 where the razor 40 also includes a handle 12 which may be identical with the handle 12 of FIG. 2. This handle 12 fixedly carries a blade-supporting structure 48 which may be identical with the blade-supporting structure 18, FIG. 3 showing how the structure 48 is curved transversely so as to provide a proper support for the blade 28 as well as to have elongated portions 50 capable of cooperating with the free ends 52 of the closure flaps 42 for camming these closure flaps between their open and closed positions in a manner well known in the art during vertical displacement of the vertically movable structure 46. In the embodiment of FIGS. 3 and 4 the vertical displaceable structure 46 also has a pair of end portions 60 to which the flaps 42 are pivoted in the manner shown most clearly in FIG. 3. However, it is to be noted that in FIG. 3 these closure flaps 42 are indeed pivoted to the end portions 60 at their inner surfaces, whereas the pivotal mounting of the flaps in the case of FIGS. 1 and 2 is at the exterior surfaces of the end portions 20 of the vertically displaceable structure.

Although the flaps 42 of FIGS. 3 and 4 are pivoted to the inner surface of the end portions 60 of the vertically displaceable structure, nevertheless these flaps 42 are made of a length at least as great as the blade 28 so as to cover the blade at its end edges and thus prevent access of the operator to these end edges.

In addition, with the embodiment of FIG. 3 the end portions 60 respectively carry end caps 70 in the form of elongated hollow members receiving the end portions 60 and fixed to the latter in any suitable way as by being welded thereto, for example, said caps providing a finishing strip for portions 60.

While there has been illustrated and described what is presently considered to be the preferred embodiment of this invention, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that various changes and modifications may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:

1. A safety razor comprising an elongated supporting plate for engaging an inner face of a blade and supporting the latter in the razor, said supporting plate having a pair of opposed ends, a pair of elongated closure fiap supports respectively extending along said opposed ends of said supporting plate, and a pair of closure flaps pivotally carried by said flap supports for movement between open and closed positions, said flaps in said closed positions thereof engaging an outer face of a blade and substantially covering the latter, said closure flaps each having a length greater than that of the blade and terminating in a pair of opposed stepped end portions directly engaging and extending freely beyond the end edges of the blade to prevent the end edges of the blade from projecting beyond the confines of the razor.

2. A safety razor as recited in claim 1 and wherein said closure flaps have depending portions pivotally connected to said flap supports and overlapping exterior faces thereof, said flap supports being situated from each other by a distance less than the length of the blade so that when said closure flaps are in their open position the end edges of the blade will be freely accessible beyond said flap supports.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,035,111 3/1936 Behrman 30-59 2,644,229 7/1953 Muros 30-605 2,698,995 1/1955 Anastasia 30-605 2,729,888 1/1956 OShea 30-605 2,748,467 6/ 1956 Shnitzler 30-605 2,780,866 2/1957 Borden 30-60.5 2,846,763 8/ 1958 Spatford 30-605 3,027,637 4/1962 Seiler 30-605 WILLIAM FELDMAN, Primary Examiner.

MYRON C. KRUSE, Examiner. 

